It's an okay week for DVD. I'm going to keep these short and sweet
because I'm busy gearing up for San Diego. I hope you all can get
there and check our panel out. It's gonna be super sweet, with
giveaways, information about upcoming titles and of course... me,
making my first public appearance as a Bits
editor. I was at a DVD awards show a few years ago, but that was for
industry folk. This will be my first chance to rub shoulders with
the great unwashed. Just be sure to be Sure, okay?

Anyway, here's what I gots to say this week...

Castle
Keep

Castle Keep is a fun war
flick directed by Sydney Pollack, and I list this first not
because of an alphabetical agenda, but because you need to avoid
it. Columbia TriStar saw fit to release this film pan and scan
and that's really a poor decision. Don't buy this disc, even
though it's an enjoyable little flick. I hope Columbia sees the
error and recalls this and does it right. Bah.

Confessions
of a Teenage Drama Queen

I have a small movie-watching rule: once there's a cut-to of a
cute guy's butt in jeans, I recognize that this is not a film
meant for my eyes and I turn it off. But with Confessions
up to that I could see that this was a by-the-numbers teen flick
about an odd girl with hopes and dreams of fitting into a world
that already seems too small for her. Now we'll all know what it
feels like to be Lindsay Lohan. Disney's DVD is presented in
both full frame and anamorphic widescreen and both look good.
Sound is in DD 5.1 and sound as good as can be expected. The
disc is THX certified; so what more can you ask for? Extras
include a very "Lohan is the best ever" making-of
featurettes, a music video for Lohan's song "That Girl"
a deleted scene and a rapid fire and nugget filled commentary
(on the widescreen version of the film only) with the film's
director, writer and co-producers. It's not a very good film
from what I can tell, but if you're a 15-year-old girl, it might
be fun.

Early
Summer

Criterion drops into our waiting laps the 1951 Yasujiro Ozu tale
of a young independent woman in post-WWII Japan who is arranged
to marry by her family, but chooses her own way in life. It's a
simple tale, but a complicated one as well. Probably my favorite
Ozu film, it's immediately charming because of the characters
and their interactions. Setsuko Hara plays the independent woman
Noriko and is a revelation. Criterion presents Early
Summer in its original full frame and it looks
gorgeous. Sound is a Japanese DD 2.0 mono. Extras include a
fascinating commentary by Japanese film expert Donald Richie, a
look at Ozu by his peers and crew members in Ozu's
Film's From Behind the Scenes, trailer and liner note
booklet with essays by Jim Jarmusch and David Bordwell. It's a
beautiful film everyone should check out.

How's
Your News?

I love this film. A group of physically and mentally challenged
people hop in a beat up Winnebago and drive around the country
talking to people about their news and singing songs as they go.
There are some great moments of power in this, and lots of
humor. It helps to know that Matt Stone and Trey Parker funded
this because they thought it was cool that they people
confronted the world with their challenges and dared you to base
your opinions on just how they look. The video is full frame and
looks good, and it sounds fine as well. Extras include
commentary with the cast, the rarely seen pilot, film festival
footage, an interview with Trey and Matt conducted by the How's
Your News? staff, an episode of IFC's Split
Screen dedicated to the film, the glorious and grand
Ron Simonsen interviewing his idol Chad Everett on the beach and
an audio interview from NPR's This
American Life. This is a fun film, and if you go gaga
over documentaries, this is one that will surely please.

Playboy
Exposed: Jamaica'n Me Wild

Not quite a Girl's Gone Wild
rip-off as it looks from the packaging, this is a documentary of
sorts focused on Playboy's visit to Hedonism III where hot porn
stars and their friends judge a debauchery fest where some
stripper hot chicks reveal all and party down. The show is MC'ed
and guided by Playboy Online cyber model Amy Miller. The video
quality is not very good, looks sourced from a high-end consumer
camera with nifty camera effects. Sound is obscured by the
locales, but who's listening when there are boobies afoot, huh?
Extras include a photo gallery you can go through manually or
with auto-play and a bunch of trailers for other fun Playboy
videos.

Playboy's
No Boys Allowed 2

Way more interesting is this one. No
Boys Allowed 2 is a collection of hot
Playmate-on-Playmate action. It's cheesy fun where two
adventurous girls stumble on a bed in the middle of the jungle
and strip down in slow-mo or have hot water fights in their
daisy dukes. If you're into softcore porn, then this just might
be the DVD for you. Extras include amateur home video from Sexy
Girl Next Door Chelsea Chandler, a clip from Wet
and Wild Live, a scene from Hollywood
Sins, Playmate data sheets, videographies for the
girls and trailers for other Playboy DVDs.

Port
of Shadows

In one of their lighter titles in a while Criterion delivers to
us a beautiful copy of Marcel Carne's Port
of Shadows it's a dark and violent tale with some
warmth and compassion thrown in for balance. That is until the
end. An AWOL drifter arrives at Le Havre, a harbor for the lost
souls of France. There he meets some rather color folks rendered
against some of the darkest photography found ever on film. This
is a beautiful film, but one that will take a weathered cinema
fan to truly appreciate. Criterion does a stellar job giving us
this film in all of its black and white glory. It's full frame
and mono as was it's original release. Extras include a nice fat
booklet on the film and Carne as well as the film's trailer and
a gallery of stills and posters.

There's
some good TV DVD releases this week...

Aqua
Teen Hunger Force: Volume Two

Probably the most sofa king we Todd Ed show ever made, and for
that I love it so very much. Be sure to run out and pick a copy
up for yourself and see why I think it's cool. It's worth it,
just to see Ignignokt flipping you the bird (right before he
sodomizes his vast imagination with pornography) underneath the
packaging sleeve.

Volume Two picks up right
where volume one ended, which shouldn't surprise any of you out
there. It packs some really good episodes like Universal
Remonster, Meat Zone
and Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas
Past From the Future. All the shows look great and
sound even better in DD 5.1 sound. Schooly D never sounded
better. On top of that we get three commentaries with the show's
creators and crew, a funny as shit making of featurette entitled
Future Wolf II: Never Cry Wolf: The
Origin of the Series where we see for the first time,
definitive proof that some of the best show ideas come from the
minds of fluffy sock puppets. There's also a really funny
episode of Space Ghost Coast to Coast
entitled Baffler Meal
which stars alternate dimension Aqua
Teen Hunger Force characters laying waste to the Space
Ghost set (this episode also features commentary with
the show creators and crew), a video from the song featured in
Baffler, a few deleted
scenes and a bunch of production art under the title Future
Wolf III. If you love this show, and c'mon, who
doesn't, you'll want to pick up a copy today. And wait 'til you
get a load of Volume Three,
a little birdy tells me it's gonna be even cooler.

Sealab
2021: Season One

Can't say I'm much of a fan of this show. But I can say it
makes for a good DVD. Not as killer as Aqua
Teen considering it's missing commentary tracks, but
it does have a few nice extras. Sealab
is pretty low-tech considering but it's never looked better on
TV. The full frame transfers are spotless save for the video
artifacts made while creating each episode. Sound is a full DD
2.0. To go along with the shenanigans underwater, Cartoon
Network's Adult Swim added the original pilot pitch show,
alternate endings for the first episode I,
Robot, the end credits to Radio
Free Sealab free of bleeps and some deleted scenes to
Little Orphan Angry. My
favorite episode will always be All
That Jazz where Murphy is trapped under a Bebop Cola
machine loosing his teeth and becoming addicted to scorpion
venom while his crew is away at an MC Cris concert. It's a good
one and it's on this set. Check it out.

Starsky
&Hutch: The Complete Second Season

Season Two of this kick
ass 70s cop show keeps on truckin' along. The episodes are cool
with guest stars galore and slick locales and they all look
pretty killer. 25 episodes are spread over 5 discs with a few
extras including ads for other Columbia TriStar TV box sets and
the original TV spots for the series. It's pretty cool, and if
you're a fan of the show, you'll definitely want to pick this
set up.